


in lieu of the sea

by seclusion



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Alternate Universe, M/M, the betrayal of the viola (2021)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-28
Updated: 2021-02-28
Packaged: 2021-03-12 17:48:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,576
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29763336
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/seclusion/pseuds/seclusion
Summary: See you watching me over the divide. Won’t you follow the music to the water to the music?
Relationships: Kunimi Akira/Tsukishima Kei
Comments: 2
Kudos: 2
Collections: Haikyuu Writer Jukebox Round One - Mitski





	in lieu of the sea

**Author's Note:**

> content warnings: mention of blood, weirdly detailed description of a violin because maybe i do miss playing a string instrument

Kei goes to the sea, because he has nowhere else left to go.

The seaside town is far, far removed from the hectic cities he’s used to travelling in, and tiny, with a population of what must be under two hundred inhabitants. The few dozens of people outside barely spare him a glance as he limps by. He’s not bleeding anymore, which is good, and he feels well enough to buy and eat an apple from a street side vendor. The burly man wearing coveralls doesn’t ask him a single question, about why he walks so slowly, or why everything underneath an obviously expensive coat is tattered and falling apart at the seams, or he carries the face of Tsukishima Kei. Just hands him the apple, in exchange for a copper coin.

The apple is bruised, not fresh, but sweet and breaks apart over the bitter taste in his mouth. He likes this town, with its calm, unassuming people. He could stay here for a while, a week, a month. Maybe two or three even, if he were lucky. 

Sand, sun, sky; once upon a time, it was all he needed. Kei drags a toe through the grains filling up the cracks between the cobblestone and continues down a random street, looking for something. He can’t pinpoint it yet, but it’s there. It’s always there. 

Toss a die high up into the air, watch it clatter onto a glass table. 

His side is throbbing, waves rippling through his body, but he knows it’ll be fine. It’s not just him trying to convince himself; Kei doesn’t see the use in lying to himself. He’s learned, already. 

Passing the inn—he’s a bit surprised that there’s an inn in the first place—because nothing good ever springs up from a place where people are expected to stay, Kei finds it, his last and only. He brings up what is left of himself, too-heavy coat and worn, holey socks and drooping hat up to the door and tosses the die. Salvation, or destruction. 

The die is weighted, in his favor. 

It’s always been like that. Kei suspects Akiteru is the one who enabled that, or Tadashi even, but he doesn’t think too hard. He just takes the unlikely chances that keep falling into his hands and uses them up, waiting for the next. Searching for the next. 

The door opens without a sound.

The man smiles thin. “Tsukishima Kei, fifth most wanted man. To what do I owe the pleasure?”

“A place,” Kei replies. It’s landed, once again, face-up on a five. “A place to stay.”

Opening the door wider, the man lets him in. Kei steps through the doorway gratefully, too winded to take in the details of the interior. He slips off the coat and drapes it over his arm, then hisses as he lurches to the side. 

“You’re hurt, right?”

“I’m fine,” he dismisses. Kei will deal with it himself, as he’s done for the past two years.

The man nods. “Kunimi Akira. Bath?”

Wordlessly, Kei nods; the man doesn’t speak much, which suits him just fine. His own words dried up long ago. Kunimi leads him down a narrow hallway into a bathroom and turns on the water, setting out a bar of soap on the side. He nods at Kei, then closes the door. 

Kei crosses over the cracked tiles and refuses to glance into the smudgy mirror, digging deep in the huge pockets of the coat. He finds the small, dented tin box and uses his remainder of his meager supplies up, sighing he slips into hot water. It’s warm and calm, sinking under his nails and washing away the grit. Tipping his head back, Kei watches the ceiling peel slowly, white flakes ready to fall at any moment. Like snow he’s never seen. 

He’s not bleeding. He’s healing. It’s a lovely place to be. 

A month’s respite, and Kei will leave this lovely place, to find his next last and only. He laughs as he trails a finger through the water; even at the edge of the world, the hope that _there must be more than this_ drives him on. And because there must be more than this, he will find the world after this one. 

Kei will put on the clean clothes that Kunimi so thoughtfully laid out for him and wash the dirty ones lying in a heap in the sink, after his skin is clean. He’ll stay here for a few weeks, planning until his brain overheats. He’ll put on his pathetic excuse for boots and his out-of-place hat and the coat and exit the door for the last time, beginning the last mile of his thousand-mile journey for what must be the hundredth time. 

That is after, though. For now, he is becoming lighter again, in a cramped bathroom with a duck-shaped soap in his hand. It’s cute, rough edges and sharp planes softening when he drips water on it. He wonders if Kunimi’s the one who carved it. 

⚄

“You can play it, you know.”

Kunimi hasn’t even looked up from the book he’s reading, but Kei must’ve been more obvious with his glances than he thought. The black case rests innocently against the wall, light and easy to miss. 

Kei shakes his head. “It’s fine.”

“Is that all you ever say?” Kunimi turns a page idly, eyes never flicking up. “Your fingers are trembling. I don’t even know how to play that thing, so go ahead.”

He looks down, and his fingers are not trembling. They’re twitching and curling though, so Kei gives in and walks over to the case, stomach already buzzing with anticipation. He shouldn’t do it; it’s been years, longer than two years, and it won’t do to dwell in the past. It’s been years, and he’s willingly shut himself off from nostalgia or anything of the kind, and he shouldn’t do it. 

The oh-so-familiar _zip_ sound sends Kei’s heart racing. 

The case opens, and it’s the most beautiful thing he’s seen in a long, long time. 

He lifts the violin out gently, and he’s trembling now, all over, because it’s red-brown and glossy and solid and _real._ He plucks at the G string, which twangs awfully flat and sounds closer to an E, and it reverberates in his ears. Running a hesitant finger over the outer curve, the upper bout, Kei admits that he’s useless when faced with this instrument. 

In every instrument store he’s walked past, every person with a case in their hand or slung over their shoulder, there is a glow. Kei has never been able to escape music. 

Humming an A under his breath, Kei tunes the A string with a peg, startling as it snaps apart under the tension. His heart sinks for a moment—then, he flips up the cover of the case and extracts a pack of new strings. He doesn’t know how many years this violin has been locked up, but he peeks through the f-holes and reads the year of creation printed carefully inside. It’s old, this one. 

Threading the end of the string through the hole in the peg, Kei twists the new strings in place of the fraying old ones and feels a rush of satisfaction as it grows taut underneath his fingertips. He hums the A again and listens for the right pitch, using the fine tuners as it gets closer. It’s probably not at all precise, but it’s close enough. Kei’s never had perfect pitch; that was an Akiteru thing. 

Lots of things are Akiteru things, Kei realizes as he rediscovers the sound of a violin. He traces the slope from fingerboard to nut to the elegant arch of the scroll, just as his brother would’ve. Plucks from G-D-A-E, then the first F, just as his brother would’ve. This violin looks nothing like Akiteru’s; his was yellow and didn’t have a line running down the back and probably far more expensive, but there’s a warmth to the tone that reminds Kei of Akiteru’s song.

He could cry, holding the past and a foreign violin in his forgotten hands. 

Instead, Kei smiles at the light puff of rosin left between the bridge and the fingerboard and tightens the loose hairs of the wooden bow, and decides to make music. He glances over at Kunimi, who’s still buried in his book, closed off from the outside world. 

Bow to string, move your fingers instead of your palm. Relax and let your shoulders and elbow drop. The bow will lead you. 

It’s a terrible thing that first emerges, made from years of lost practice; shaky and inconstant, but it opens him. The open A rings through the body of the violin and the room he’s standing in, touching core and heart. It’s terrible, ugly; Kei plays it again, and again, and again, until the wrist of his right hand feels mobile again. 

How lucky, Kei marvels, that his fingers and hands and arms have escaped permanent, life-changing damage. There were still incidents, scars on his palm and on the inside of his right elbow, but he’s still able to do this. To play the instrument he’s never been good at, not enough to stand on the stage of a grand, majestic auditorium and perform for an audience of thousands, but still loved. Loves, he discovers, as the once-calloused fingers of his left hand land on the fingerboard, pressing the metal down. 

Years of experience has deserted him, but still more years remain. Kei doesn’t know this violin, fingers refusing the coordination that he’d built up, and he feels as if he’s glowing. Clumsily, he plays a slow G major scale, the most basic. His left hand misses the jump to third position that he’d done on instinct for so long, and starts over. 

Move the entire arm, think about the next note instead of the exact position. Your hand remembers. Your fingers remember. 

He’s wavering in fifth position, a pinky extension to a fourth G, the note drawn out and hesitant. But hesitance is what deals tension, and he’s been bold for the last two years, so Kei ignores the whistle of a poorly played note and lets the bow skate across the string. 

There’s no clock displayed on the wall, but it’s probably only been fifteen minutes. His stamina has decreased greatly—there’s the tenseness of his muscles that he thought he’d outgrown already—and his muscles complain as he stretches out his arm. It wouldn’t do to pull something and waste away the time he has left. 

Kei places the violin back in the case gently, and remembers that he isn’t the only person in the room. He glances at Kunimi; his nose is still buried in the book. 

Kunimi speaks anyway. “That was awful.”

“I know,” Kei replies, feeling his eyebrow twitch. He presses an aching hand to his forehead, fingertips throbbing from metal biting deep. It’s been so, so long. He’s nothing like he was when he left, notes flying off of the strings with precision and a left hand that feared nothing. 

“Still,” says Kunimi, placing his book down, “you love it, don’t you? You played for over an hour.”

An hour, huh. Kei remembers Akiteru saying _time passes faster when you’re doing something you love._

“I do.” Brushing a finger over the stick of the bow, Kei twists the screw five times; another Akiteru thing. The bow hair loosens again, and he replaces it back in the case carefully. 

Kunimi stares at him for a few moments, eyes narrowed, then picks up his book again. 

It’s quiet for a while, Kei just sitting on the ground and staring at the violin. He’d thought it was left in the past, the scales and pieces and muscle memory and the sheer joy of working through a hard passage, since he’d left everything behind. But he’d fallen so easily the second he’d seen the light hit the chipped varnish, leaving a bittersweet taste on his tongue. 

And with the muscle memory comes memories of Akiteru, his violin teacher, Tadashi, and golden afternoons spent practicing, full of frustration and wrong notes and laughter. Kei doesn’t want to—can’t afford to let himself drown in them, can’t let the quicksand reach his waist, so he closes the case and zips it back up. 

This violin is simultaneously the best and worst thing that’s happened to him over the past two years. 

⚄

Kunimi doesn’t let Kei pine after the instrument. Kei only looks at it longingly once the morning after, _once,_ but Kunimi immediately shoos him away from the dining table towards the closed case, rejecting his offer to help wash the dishes. 

Soon, the sounds of bow on strings join that of water rushing from the faucet, and Kei warms up his stiff fingers, leaning into exercises that quickly become familiar again. Scales, scales, variations. Up-and-down, staccato, legato, marcato. His skills were built from the basics, and Kei knows that in order to regain anything close to what he had before, he has to spend time working through them. 

He plays until Kunimi taps his shoulder, pointing at the table. There are plates set out neatly again, silverware laid out. A glass pitcher filled with dark red liquid sits in the center. 

Before he joins Kei at the table, Kunimi pushes open the window. Cool air enters, causing the drapes to billow outwards lightly. 

They press their hands together, then begin to eat in silence. Kei sneaks a few looks at his host between bites; there’s a tranquility in the way he moves his hands, precision as he picks up his chopsticks. It’s like every movement takes the shortest path, ensuring the highest efficiency. 

“What book were you reading earlier?” asks Kei, surprising even himself. 

A seagull squawks outside as Kunimi pours cranberry juice from the pitcher, ice cubes clinking as they fall into his cup. He takes his time before answering, eyes slipping shut as he takes a sip. 

“The Old Man and the Sea.”

“A translated version? Oh, thank you,” Kei says, watching juice splash into his cup. 

Kunimi taps the side of his glass. “No, in English.”

“You speak English?”

“No, I don’t.”

Kei recalls his mental image of the book: a beat-down, thin thing, the spine bent and broken with love. He thinks that if he snuck a peek at the pages, there would be notes scrawled all over. The original black ink would nearly be covered up by the sheer volume of all the notes, lost in translation. 

“You must love it,” he says casually, testing. 

Kunimi’s eyes flick up sharply. “My...friend loved it.”

Evasion, but there are things Kei would prefer not to dig too deeply into as well. The past is a cutting, unchangeable thing, blurred only by the inconsistency of memory. Pushing the thought out of his mind, he focuses on the food in front of him. He presses his wrist into the clean tablecloth and swallows, savoring the flavor. Kunimi is a good cook. 

When they finish, Kei waves away Kunimi’s refusal, joining him at the sink. The air is fresh by the sea, and he flicks suds off of his elbow as he works. Kunimi’s arm is unexpectedly warm, brushing over Kei’s as he reaches over to dry a fork. 

His fingers are smooth and unblemished too, Kei notices. Slender, proportionate; fit to hold a calligraphy brush. He imagines those fingers holding the slim stem of the brush upright, pushing deep black ink onto delicate paper. One long, satisfying stroke. 

Kunimi gives him a nudge. “You’ve been washing that plate for a minute now.”

“Oh.” He blinks, drags his eyes away from the half-moon lunula at the base of Kunimi’s fingernails. “Spaced out for a moment.”

Picking up another plate, Kei switches his attention to his own hands. Scars, unwanted souvenirs on his palms, nicks along the insides of his fingers. But even as he wipes away a spot of oil from the porcelain, he’s delighted with every bend, every motion. He can still play violin. 

He wiggles his fingers, closes them into a fist; wonder. Wonder at the second chance he’s been given, here at the edge of this world, on the brink of another. 

Kei looks up to see Kunimi’s nearly unreadable expression. There’s only the slightest widening of his eyes—so minute he almost missed it—then, he turns away. 

The notes that come out of the violin afterwards have more clarity than the day before, but Kei gets the lingering scent of the past and graceful fingers all mixed up in his head. 

⚄

A few days later, when his music is beginning to touch the relaxed streams it once swam in, Kei notices that his fingernails have grown too long, making it difficult to play accurately. He sets the violin and bow down and wanders over to where Kunimi is reading. 

It’s a different book today, something bound in yellow with vertical Japanese characters running down the page. Kunimi startles a bit when his shoulder is tapped, causing Kei to laugh. 

“You have nail clippers, or scissors or something? They’re a bit long,” he says. 

Nodding, Kunimi walks over to the kitchen and opens a drawer, taking out a slim pair of metal scissors. Kei moves to take it from him, but Kunimi shakes his head and pushes him into a chair. He pulls another chair directly opposite him and sits down. 

Clicking his teeth, Kunimi inspects the sorry state of Kei’s fingernails, jagged and unevenly cut. “Do I even want to know how you cut these?”

“No,” Kei admits. It’s not something he would take pleasure in revisiting either. 

“Okay,” Kunimi sighs, and begins to trim his nails carefully, starting from his left thumb. He’s gentle, making sure that he doesn’t accidentally clip into Kei’s skin, and he cuts them more neatly than Kei ever could. 

Kei watches Kunimi watch his craft intently, and he feels like he did in the bath that first day: bathed in warmth and kindness, safe. There’s nothing on Kunimi’s face to indicate softness, but he brushes a finger over the scar on his palm and there’s a subtle shift in his shoulders. 

“It doesn’t hurt,” he tells him. 

“Really?” Kunimi pushes into the center, harder. Kei’s about to protest—of course it’s going to hurt, if Kunimi stabs his fingernail into his skin—but he catches a tiny smile on the curve of his lips, and he settles for smiling himself. 

⚄

“Stop,” Kunimi says. 

Kei doesn’t want to. He’s almost there—once he gets it right the fifth time, he knows he’ll have relearned it. Up and down, don’t place the first finger down out of habit, again, skip it, again—

“Kei,” and he stops. Kunimi looks wan, and there’s a pang of guilt that strikes Kei right in his chest. “You skipped lunch. It’s five now.”

Did he? Kei could swear that the sun was still overhead; but the room is dimmer, and there’s fresh food on the table already. He sets down the violin, shamefaced, gets his apologies accepted with a roll of Kunimi’s eyes. 

“Let’s go outside after this,” Kunimi suggests, except the suggestion is not really a suggestion. 

Kei nods, finishes his food, puts on his old boots and steps out into ocean wind. They cross the short path to the sandy beach together, toeing the line between the damp and the dry. Breathing deep, Kei takes the salty air into his lungs. It’s been too long since he was outside. 

In the distance, there’s a fisherman swinging his legs off the dock, not a single boat on the sparkling water. The sun is fast approaching the horizon, casting lengthy shadows. 

The path is easy and calm to walk, and somewhere along the way Kunimi loses his sandals and Kei loses his boots. Sand scrubs at his feet and he relishes the feeling, digging his toes in. A crab skitters in front of them, a dull brown shape popping in and out. Cool, clear water sloshes over their feet. 

Kunimi yelps as a strand of seaweed wraps its slimy grip around his ankle, jumping aside and bumping into Kei. He catches Kunimi’s narrow body around the waist and they laugh together, pleasantly surprised. 

Later, as they retrieve their wet shoes, their knuckles brush once, twice. Kunimi slips his hand into Kei’s without looking at him, and Kei has to press his lips together to keep from smiling. 

The ocean waves are their own sort of music, Kei thinks. If he wasn’t to have a violin, he wouldn’t mind listening to these. How lovely this place is.

Kunimi’s grip is loose. Instead of letting his fingers fall free, Kei holds on, tight. 

⚄

“Kei,” Akira says, lashes droopy and voice hoarse from exhaustion, “what was that song you were playing earlier? The one that was really slow.”

“I don’t remember the name,” admits Kei. He shifts, tugging the blanket over Akira’s exposed shoulders, pale in the soft bleed of moonlight through gauzy drapes. 

Akira presses his face into the pillow. “It sounds like a goodbye, that one. Can you not play it anymore?”

Kei wants to protest that it sounds more like a requiem, or a nostalgic return to the past, but music has a way of meaning something different to everyone who hears it. He simply acquiesces and curls into the man beside him, heart crumbling slightly at the sound of Akira’s relieved sigh. 

In the back of his mind, a constant timer ticks: three, two weeks left. One week, five days. 

⚄

And all at once, it’s time for him to leave. The small town has suddenly begun to buzz over the last two days, constant motion of people sharply contrasting the earlier sleepiness; ships have docked. A man wearing a uniform was spotted yesterday. Kei can recognize the signs, even if he doesn’t want to. So he plays one last slow song, loosens the hair on the bow and straps the violin back in. Zips up the case and returns the clothes Akira gave him, clean and folded. 

Bids him a short goodbye at the door; a short, soft kiss and he’s off, in raggedy clothes and his still-new coat, to find his next world. 

There’s a great deal more regret in this last departure, but Kei doesn’t let himself drag his feet. He takes long, steady strides towards the boat he’ll be travelling on, squeezing the refilled tin box in his pocket. His fingers ache. He doesn’t know whether they yearn for Akira’s, or for the strings of a violin. 

He doesn’t stop to buy an apple this time, or to stare at his surroundings. Kei keeps his head low and focuses on the blur of the ground moving beneath him, focuses on _next next next._ Violin behind him again. Past behind him again. 

Kunimi Akira, behind him. 

Kei reaches the dock and stares up at the broad ship, sails billowing in the wind. A woman wearing white leans over the railing and raises a hand; Kei raises one hand, and she lets out a piercing whistle. He’s good to go.

Before he crosses over, Kei lets himself look back, just once. The small seaside town; he’ll have fonder memories of here than most places, but he’s unlikely to revisit them. He drinks in the outline of the buildings and the faded mountains beyond, the hilly terrain sloping up to the sky. He takes in the sound of seagulls cawing, the music of the ocean, and—

“Kei!”

The call of his name. Kunimi Akira, behind him. 

He appears out of what seems like nowhere, clutching a violin case in one hand and a book in the other. Kei watches as he stumbles closer, heart shaking in its cage. 

“Kei,” he gasps, blinking sweat out of his eyes. “Take—this, please.”

Akira holds out both the violin and the worn book. As Kei closes his fingers over the handle of the case, brushing against Akira’s, the sadness he’s tried to push away wells up. 

“Take this too,” Akira says, motioning at the book. It’s _The Old Man and the Sea,_ the one Kei’s seen Akira annotating, shabby cover and ink-filled pages. 

Kei tries to smile. “I can’t read English, Akira.”

“You can learn,” he presses on. He sounds more vulnerable than Kei’s ever heard him, but still he shoves it towards him, resolute. 

“I mean,” Kei hesitates. He squeezes the handle he’s clutching, and thinks about the sound of a violin and ocean waves, and the best food he’s had in months. Sand, sun, sky; he’s found it again, not in a place but a person. “I want you to read it to me.”

Akira’s hand tightens on the book, knuckles turning white. “I can’t do that.”

He lost his dice in the sand on the way here. The one Kei squeezes in his palm now is unweighted, cheap, fair. When he tosses it, the edges glint in the sun, spinning end over end.

“Will you come with me, Akira?”

The expression on Akira’s face reads almost like betrayal. He shakes his head once, extended hand dropping to his side. “You would…?”

“Please,” Kei says, knowing that _please_ is not enough. He’s asking Akira to leave behind everything, for a tired man and his violin, to go to places unknown. Places that aren’t guaranteed to be as lovely as this town. 

They’re quiet for a while, as crew members move around behind them and shout instructions at each other. Kei tries to be understanding, tries to convince himself that this is what would’ve happened anyway. That this is just a last-ditch attempt, something that he never relies on. The mountains a long way away are shrouded in fog; Kei tries to protect himself like that, make a cocoon. 

It doesn’t work, obviously. Fog is just a cloud, water droplets in condensation. Kei’s still rooted in the moment, listening to everything around him. 

“I don’t get seasick,” Akira mumbles, staring at a point over Kei’s shoulder. 

Hope, rises. 

“And I can’t believe the last song you played to me was the sad one. I _told_ you I liked the faster one that you played three days ago. And you still kind of suck.” Kei’s heart is beating out of its cage, hard and fast. Hope rushes through him—

“My friend would want me to go, too,” Akira concludes, taking a step towards him. 

Kei can’t control the smile that escapes. “But do _you_ want to go?”

“Yeah,” and the corners of Akira’s eyes have lifted, and his hand holds tight to Kei’s. Kei feels almost like shouting something in victory, but that’d be unbecoming of him, and so he tugs Akira onboard with haste, and they rest their elbows on the railing as the sails fan out and the journey begins. 

⚄

“Did you get any of that?” 

“Nope,” Kei replies, trying to rest a hand casually on his case. 

Akira rolls his eyes and shuts the book, body moving with the gentle sway of the ship. “I knew you zoned out after the tenth word. So, have at it.” He nods at the waiting violin case. “What do you have for me today?”

Kei tilts his head into the familiar weight of the violin, lifting bow over string. Drags out a note that sounds like the sea, bold and full of promise. 

“Something old and something new.”

**Author's Note:**

> sorry kunitsukki u guys deserve a 30k slowburn not whatever this is. what au is this? no one knows...there seems to be a lack of electronic technology but the old man and the sea still exists. well if u think about parallel universes and assume that something happened to stop technological development along this branch after 1951 it is possible. scifi makes anything possible. gwahh i just want to write cyberpunk cant focus enough to fix this (if u have any fic recs along that lane. please.)
> 
> the song is [Because Dreaming Costs Money, My Dear](https://open.spotify.com/track/2DWf9b143xSKlm7ZWn4nVP?autoplay=true)


End file.
